Category: My Work

Worries: not artistic, I personally don’t believe I am a creative person/don’t know how to think outside of the box.

To me, analyzing art unearthed the same trauma as having to write an essay on a DBQ in AP History. Despite my initial concerns, I was surprised by how deeply I considered each assignment and how carefully I contemplated each image. Going into the Metaphorical Me project, I wasn’t thinking much about the elements but rather just what felt “right” to me. After a lengthy google search, this is ultimately the image I chose to represent me:

Now I have the vocabulary to articulate that I was drawn by the repetition and texture of the aloe vera tendrils and the contrast between the dark, damp soil and the bright green aloe plant. While formal elements are the components that make up an image, they are also what leads to finding and describing meaning.  In this case, this image inspired thoughts of dirty vs. clean, decomposing vs. healing, gritty vs. smooth. There is such a contrast between the brown of the soil and the green of the aloe vera, both in how they look and what they represent. The dirt helps to elevate the aloe vera’s healing properties, with the vibrant green of the leaves symbolizing life. The fact that the leaves are not contained within the borders opens up the possibility of the tendrils continuing to reach towards the sky.  All these elements (lines, texture, shape, color) come together to convey a narrative. Going through my group’s adjectives and chosen images, I was blown away by how their images captured their essence so perfectly. After some suggestions from my group, I chose the following as my final image:

 

This image also tells a story: harmony, collaboration, trust. The bees all form one line, balancing each other out perfectly.  The eye follows the line from one side to the other; in contrast to the plant, this line is moving horizontally instead of vertically. Once I decided on bees, I went through various potential images. These were second and third place, respectively:

 

All three images have bees but their elements convey different meanings. I almost chose the photograph to the left but decided in favor of the chain of bees. Looking at the photograph of the bee on frost-covered tall grass, I could almost feel my fingers burning from imagining the cold ice. The bee not only seems to be almost frozen along with the grass but it’s also alone, which conveys a feeling of loneliness and isolation. The realism is what elevates this image, as I don’t think the same feeling could be communicated through a watercolor painting. In fact, to me, images of watercoloring paintings of winter scenes have an almost innate feeling of warmth and softness to them. For the watercolor bee, which places emphasis on the flower and the bee, it conveys serenity and simplicity, with the bee and dandelion being the focal point. The lines are relaxed and curved, rather than rigid. The colors are cohesive and peaceful. The bee is at rest and so is the flower and the greenery surrounding it. Ultimately, I decided that choosing this image would be insincere to myself, since I consider myself more rigid than easy-going. 

It was amazing to see how these images evoked such feelings from me, and even more so how I was able to verbalize these feelings using the terminology I learned. Working on finding an image to describe myself and searching for art elements around me were two sides of the same coin; both explored the elements of art and how you could use these to tell a story. I was honored that one of my team members mentioned that this picture I took of my door looked “mysterious and angsty”. Although that might not have been the story I was trying to tell, they were able to find meaning in the shadows and the value. As I was going around my small basement apartment ¹, I got my “creative juices flowing” as my high school Chinese teacher used to say, and explored different ways to redefine everyday items. Some seemed a little silly at first but I felt like I was back in my freshman year photography class, thinking about how to capture these elements in the wild. 

As I searched on the web for images that could express the adjectives I’d chosen for myself, all the images I found (except for the water color image) turned out to be stock images, which took me down a rabbit hole of what a “standard license” was. Overall, I discovered that I needed to either purchase these items or create a free trial account in order to be allowed to use them. I definitely do not want to be sued for copyright infringement so I went for the latter. I was curious about what CC images were available so I perused Flickr and there were definitely some images I could’ve used instead. When it came to uploading an image on Flickr, my group chose the picture I took of my Gecko’s terrarium. We decided on the attribution license so that at least I would get some credit if someone decided to use it and called it a day.